THE INDIVIDUALIST POLITY AND THE PREVALENCE OF PROFESSIONALIZED PSYCHOLOGY - A CROSS-NATIONAL-STUDY

Contemporary societies are organized around models in which both colle ctive and individual goods, resources, and other properties are centra l. These models are highly developed and rationalized so that scientif ic and cultural scrutiny of their core elements are highly legitimated . In almost all of these models, the individual is such a core element -as an ultimate sovereign, beneficiary, and as a component of the coll ective. This produces social arrangements in which scientized and prof essionalized attention to the inner structure and behavior of the indi vidual receives much public attention. Using multiple indicator models , we show that those modern polities strongly centered on the individu al as a core component create higher levels of professionalized psycho logy than do other polities, even when general social and economic res ources and complexity (and some other controls) are held constant.